Saturday, February 2, 2013

My response to the Jezebel.com Article

http://jezebel.com/5980498/walking-dead-porn-parody-relies-on-yellowface And here's the response that somehow isn't being published on the site...

Hey, Tommy Pistol and I'd like to chime in here. As the writer and director of The Walking Dead parody I'd like clear up a few things. First, I am puzzled why I wasn't contacted for comments and where you aquired your "facts"? Yes, this a blog, not a newspaper or publisher, but for the amount of people reading- you owe it to your audience to be accurate. I address many of these questionable facts in my blog -www.whoistommypistol.blogspot.com But I want to entertain one here- that Glenn's ethnicity is ACTUALLY IMPORTANT see below"Much-deserved credit certainly goes to comic book creator and television series executive producer Robert Kirkman for crafting a multidimensional character. He explains his inspiration for Glenn via email: “My oldest friend is from Atlanta and is Korean, so I thought of him when I was choosing Glenn’s ethnicity. It’s important to me to try and accurately portray the world as it is, i.e., not all white, like some comics do. That said, I wanted Glenn to be resourceful and strong, a character Rick (played by Andrew Lincoln) could lean on when he needed to … not ‘the Asian guy.’” (http://iamkoream.com/october-cover-story-into-the-deep-end-with-the-walking-deads-steven-yeun/)To be honest, I din't give casting a second thought. Danny is endearing. He is strong and cavalier. He fit's Glenn's character to a T. Minus the fact he is not Korean. But there are no Korean-Americans in porn right now. SO we had to use what we were privileged to have- a great cast. Did you know our parody's Michonne is actually an Irish actress? Yep, I said Irish. What is "black" anyhow Jezebel.com???? ( "found a black actress to play the part of Katana-swinging Michonne.") To use Kenni would mean using a Thai actor with a distinctly British accent, and that wouldn't have been believable either. We made a comedic parody and in my opinion, your site has made our movie ugly. Using the terms "Yellowface" and "Blackface" are ugly, racist, derogatory and should never be used by anyone. Please stop while you are ahead and still have readers. We don't want anyone to think this site is racist, right?

2 comments:

I am honestly SHOCKED by the reactions I've seen from those associated with this film.

Joanna Angel called critics "lame asses", someone at AVN suggested that because Joanna is Jewish she's unable to do anything racist, Danny himself thinks he "maybe" owes someone an apology, and everyone keeps making the argument "oh it's just a porn parody". But this here just really takes the cake.

Yes, some of Jezebel's argument was flawed (I agree that the Keni Styles suggestion is a bit ridiculous) but it is not their criticism that has made your movie ugly. It is your misguided decision and the GOD AWFUL responses to criticism that made your movie ugly.

You think using the TERM "Yellowface" is ugly, racist and derogatory, but see no problem in actually USING yellow makeup to have a white guy play an Asian character?

I don't think the casting and makeup decisions were purposely racist but they were definitely dumb. However I'm way more offended by everyone's response to the accusations of racism than the racist act itself. The failure absorb the criticism and apologize is the bigger problem.

How hard would it be to just say "hey, we had no ill intentions, but obviously this hurt some people for whatever reason, we're sorry"? without having to defend yourself at the same time. Whether you think the criticism is valid or not, it's really messed up to tell everyone YOU ARE WRONG FOR THE WAY YOU FEEL. What's the one thing that makes white people doing racially problematic stuff WORSE? Telling everyone else that you know better than they do about how THEY SHOULD FEEL about YOUR RACISM.

That's besides the point though, if Danny was a perfect choice for the role it really wouldn't matter if he was Asian or not.You could have saved time and money by foregoing the Asian eyes makeup altogether and trusting in the performance of your actor.

Past the unintentional racism it's just distracting. It'd be like if you'd had old age makeup done for XXXorcist.